An omen for America

James Humes of Pueblo is a former White House speechwriter and author of the recently published book, “Churchill: The Prophetic Statesman.”

As July 4, 1826, approached, Americans awaited with anticipation the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. They also read with interest the newspaper accounts of the declining days of two of the last living Founding Fathers and Signers — John Adams and Thomas Jefferson — the second and third of our Presidents who lay dying in their beds at Braintree, Mass., and Monticello, Va. Jefferson slipping in and out of a coma kept asking the doctor on July 3: “Is it the Fourth of July yet?” When he was told, “No,” he willed himself to live on. After midnight, he refused any more laudanum. He wanted to die on the Fourth.

If he never asked how Adams was faring, Adams inquired repeatedly about his one-time rival, Jefferson. His last words, around 5 o’clock, July 4, were “Jefferson survives.” Actually, Jefferson had died three hours before. Bells could be faintly heard ringing in nearby Charlottesville, but cannons in Braintree had been firing since dawn.

The death of the two Founding Fathers on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence was deemed an omen by God. Preachers mounted their pulpits to exclaim this was proof that America was the new promised land, the divine fulfillment of God’s will.

Yet the two presidents who were enshrined forever that day in myth and memory were alike only in their love of America and freedom. Adams and Jefferson seldom agreed on anything. They both signed the Declaration of Independence as one mind on the need for a complete break from the Mother Country.

Although they did not attend the Constitutional Convention, they both supported the new charter, albeit with some reservations. They both agreed it needed a Bill of Rights to protect individuals against abuses by the executive. Jefferson stayed in Monticello during the convention, but sent his protege, James Madison, who played a substantive role in drafting the articles. Adams couldn’t attend. He was the new American envoy to Great Britain.

If the two of them agreed on anything, it was in their shared hatred of the two New Yorkers, the ambitious Alexander Hamilton and the treacherous Aaron Burr. Other than that, it was a case of opposites that did not attract.

Adams was a New Englander, mindful of the Puritan heritage of his forebears who settled Massachusetts to practice their pious worship.

Jefferson, on the other hand, was a Virginian, proud of his patrician standing of the aristocratic plantation set. Jefferson was 6 feet tall and towered over the 5-foot-6 1/2, somewhat dumpy Adams.

Adams admired the English for their traditions of order and civility. Jefferson, however, was a Francophile. He loved everything French — their wine, their food, their philosophers and even their Revolution.

Jefferson considered himself superior to Adams in everything but age (Jefferson, born in 1742, was five years younger). In comparison to the New Englander, he had the advantage of height, talent, looks and leadership. In a sense, the general sentiment of Americans concurs. Adams’ face is not on Mount Rushmore; nor does his countenance adorn a coin or currency.

Adams had many virtues as his superb biography by David McCulloch reveals. But charm was not one of them. He could not flatter or fake a sentiment. His flinty honesty would not permit it.

If tact was not in his personalilty, testiness was. He took offense at any slight and erupted at any personal challenge. For Adams, bluntness of manner did not render him likeable. He did not found a party like Jefferson. Jefferson could command a following.

Adams attracted no such lieutenants as Jefferson did with Madison and Monroe. But no one doubted his honesty or courage. He braved mob attacks to defend in court Captain Preston in the Boston Massacre. He won an acquittal but made few friends in his courageous defense. In contrast, in the War of Independence, Gov. Thomas Jefferson of Virginia fled the governor’s mansion in Williamsburg to escape to the country. He was criticized for not fighting back.

Adams’ integrity was manifest — his word was his bond. He never dissimulated or was deceitful. Jefferson came to President Washington at the end of his first presidential term in 1791 and urged him to run for another term probably because he didn’t want to see Adams succeed Washington as president.

Yet in Washington’s second term, when Jefferson was laying the groundwork for his anti-Federalist Democrat-Republican Party, he had his appointees in the State Department circulate rumors that the regal-style-living Washington was acting like a king.

When Jefferson denied his machinations with Washington, Washington broke off his longtime friendship with his fellow Virginian.

The presidential election of 1800 would be the most acrimonious and bitter political fight in American history. Incumbent President John Adams faced off against his vice president, Thomas Jefferson. The Virginian headed his newly formed Democratic-Republican Party, which, in Jefferson’s words, “would dethrone the Federalist regime.” The Federalists, since George Washington followed by Adams, had ruled the new nation for 12 years.

Just about all the original Founding Fathers, as well as the framers of the Constitution (with the singular exception of Madison), were Federalists. To them the new party was a radical movement to topple the pillars of government. Partisans of the federalists imagined the atheist Jefferson leading hordes burning Bibles in some kind of French revolutionary frenzy.

Adams would live to celebrate his son’s inauguration as president in 1825. It was somehow fitting that John Quincy Adams would win when the House of Representatives decided to elect Secretary of State Adams over Gen. Andrew Jackson. The father savored his son’s victory.

Jefferson’s last letter to his old rival was dictated March 25, 1826. Adams replied on April 17.

On his first day in the new Executive Mansion — that would later be called the White House — Adams wrote a letter to Abigail which he headed “The President’s House, November 2, 1800”:

“I pray heaven to bestow its blessing on this house and all that shall inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.”